


What's In A Name

by NevillesGran



Series: Juno Steel and the Good Neighbors [1]
Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fae, Canon Rewrite, Canon-Typical Violence, Changelings, Fae & Fairies, M/M, Self-Indulgent True Name Nonsense
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-09
Updated: 2019-12-09
Packaged: 2021-02-26 16:01:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,738
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21730903
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NevillesGran/pseuds/NevillesGran
Summary: Once upon a time, the Fae walked alongside mortals. They still do, sometimes—wreathed in charm and grace, shadows and smiles. Their open hands they show and their true names keep hidden.Sometimes they take children, and sometimes leave them behind.(Or: S1 but Nureyev is a faerie changeling.)
Relationships: Peter Nureyev/Juno Steel
Series: Juno Steel and the Good Neighbors [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1566202
Comments: 14
Kudos: 159





	What's In A Name

**Author's Note:**

> This fic has...SUCH overuse of dashes...

Once upon a time...

All the best stories start that way, and most of the oldest. Once upon a time...

Once upon a time, there were Martians, powerful and wise and united in mind and body. Monsters of flesh and mind, water and red earth.

They all died. Not long after came Humans, monsters of flesh and bone, earth and blue water. They thrived.

Long before any of them were the Fae, monsters of light and air and little else. They, too, are still alive, just mostly Elsewhere. Sometimes they still walk with mortals, though—wreathed in charm and grace, shadows and smiles. Their open hands they show and their true names keep hidden. 

Sometimes they take children, and sometimes leave them behind.

Once upon a time...

-—-

Here’s the thing: you always knew Mag was lying to you.

You couldn’t sense it or anything. That’s not how any of this works. But he said you were from New Kinshasa, he spun you a wonderful tale about a revolutionary father killed too soon, and in retrospect, that part _could_ have been true—you might well have had a man who thought he was your father, and it’s very easy to be struck down by the angels’ lasers. But by the time you met Mag, you’d already been running, one night, with a handful of credits and a loaf of bread in your hands, head down so the cameras couldn’t catch you and making desperately for the mouth of the tunnels, where the lasers couldn’t reach—and suddenly the angry shouts of the bread-owner redoubled as you took a wrong turn in the darkness, right back toward them, even though you were better at seeing in the dark than anyone you knew—you screwed up, you looked up—

—and then you were running through trees taller than you’d ever seen, soft with starlight, and there was nobody else around at all. There wasn’t even the sounds of cars or the smell of the city; the air was cleaner than you’d ever tasted.

You knew two things instantly: that this was _home_ , where you were from and where you belonged like you’d never belonged anywhere in your life, like you never _would_ belong anywhere else in your life—and that you _desperately_ wanted to return to the city in which you lived. The home you’d known as long as you’d known anything but your own name.

And then you back. It was just a matter of thinking and running. It was nearly dawn when you returned, where before it had been firmly night, and you were three blocks away from where you’d been. But nobody was chasing you. It was only a moment’s dash back into the tunnels with your prizes.

So, you knew that you weren’t from New Kinshasa. But it was a nice story, and you could move more silently and smile more disarmingly than anyone you knew but Mag had you beat by a mile. And you did want to bring down the holier-than-thou city with their angels that cut down those already downtrodden. 

You didn’t _want_ to be from New Kinshasa. You imagined its people were much like Them—who you met eventually, of course, as you practiced slipping in and out of the Other Place on command rather than instinct. They are tall and thin and pale; their eyes are dark and bright at once. Their ears are sharp and so are their nails and teeth. They are beautiful and elegant and as heartless as lasers from the sky; they dance in the starlight and laugh when they see you, without inviting you to join. 

The closest you got to education in what you are was when they would laugh and call you _changeling_ and _iron-poisoned_ and _Named and bound by it, little fool_.

They were right, you supposed. You’d certainly given Mag your name when he first found you—it was the only thing you’d really had to show off. If there’d been some thrill of sensation when you said it, you’d missed it, likely because you’d been beaten half to death by a gang of older thieves at the time. (You can’t escape to the Other Place from underground.)

“Say my name?” you asked him casually, the first time They taunted you with that.

“Pete?” he said, distracted as he pored over the plans of a bank.

“No—my full name.” 

He glanced up at you with a flash of bemused concern, which warmed you right down to your bones. “Peter Nureyev.”

You gasped. It was like you’d been plunged into a lake of cold water at dawn, waking you from sleep, but instead of a lake it was a waterfall—and instead of drowning, you were pulled right back up by the roots of your soul, awake and attentive as can be.

“Pete?” Mag was saying, and it wasn’t the first time he’d said it. His hand was on your shoulder and there was worry in his eyes. 

You shook it all off. “I’m fine,” you said (it’s such a vague term, it’s not a lie.) “Just wanted to hear it.” 

And he dropped it, because he had a heist to plan.

You never knew if Mag knew what you were. He never said anything, and he’s not exactly a folklore historian, but also, you never asked. You didn’t quite want to know. 

He knew some things. You can’t lie outright, you just can’t; the words stick in your throat until you choke—he treated it like a learning disability, and a game. How close could you get, how many things can one word mean—“I’m fine.” “I come as…” “Call me…” What’s the difference between a lie and playing a part, or telling a story? A story the other person doesn’t know is made up, but it’s one they want to hear? And thieving creates a debt that must be paid—but only if they catch you to call upon it. Nobody ever catches you for long. 

He was never quite satisfied and neither were you, but you made up for it in other ways. You were silent without effort, you saw in the dark as easily as day, you could disappear and reappear in literally any room so long as it was above ground and not encased in iron. (That, you practiced out of sight of Mag, and never let him see you do it on a job, either—that would invite too many questions that you didn’t want answers for.) 

You found out that you don’t appear properly on camera; there’s always just enough distortion to throw off the facial recognition software. This causes almost more problems than it solves, but with a little effort, a little pouring on of the charm, you could talk your way out of almost all of them. 

(You once looked into a mirror and released the breath you hadn’t realized you’d always been holding, and there you were: tall and pale and thin, eyes too bright and too dark at once. Your ears were pointed and so were your teeth, fit to smile and to rend.)

You’re thinking about that, now. You’re thinking about all that, as Mag holds the reactor core and tries to explain why what you helped him do is right, references the father you don’t have until you snap, “I know that’s a lie, Mag! I know it’s always been a lie!”

You think about it as you watch him sigh, a sigh he’s been holding in for ten years, and say, “Yeah, I know. I do read fairy tales.”

But he’s Mag, so the fire is back in him before you can do more than blink.

“So all the more reason to do this! So you’re...not from around here. You know what’s _right_ , Pete, and it’s the end of New Kinshasa! People are dying, and it’s up to us to stop it!”

You, too, find your footing. “And people _live,_ here, Mag! It’s their home. We can’t just—”

“They’re using their _home_ to _kill_ people!” He adjusts his grip to hold the core a little more securely. “Maybe what I said about your father was just a story—but it was a true one. There are men like that ll over Brahma, innocent people—”

In the end, you pull your knife, and he doesn’t. He casts it a disdainful look and says, “Here’s something else I stand for, Peter—”

You flinch at the first cold-shock of waterfall. The thought of dropping New Kinshasa turns your stomach, but you’ve learned enough by now to know how a Name given can be turned into a chain binding. Your hand tightens around your blade.

Mag purses his lips. “I wouldn’t do that to you, Pete. I stand for freedom for _all_ people—and I won’t draw a knife on my family.”

-—-

The next time They laugh in your face, you spit back that you killed him, all right, you killed the man who’d tricked your Name out of you. 

They keep laughing, cruel and gay. _And then you gave it away again, little fool, to an entire city!_

They’re wrong, you know it. You left your Name behind, but as a threat. A story no one wants to hear. A nightmare, tall and pale and blood-splattered in a red room, dark-eyed and full of as much terrible majesty as you could cast. Then you’d disappeared, stepped back into the sky of the Other Place and caught the wing of a passing dragon, offered her your golden chain of Outer Rim office for a ride to anywhere else. You’ve always wondered how far you could go in the Other Place, if you could get off planet without being tracked by any computer nor seen by any human being.

(You’ll realize over the next couple decades that you may have left your name behind, but you didn’t leave your Name. But nor did you give it away. You won’t do that again—until a particularly exciting job in Hyperion City.)

-—-

The reasons you give the detective your Name are fourfold, like a lucky clover:

You are absolutely certain, with every ounce of intuition and deep in what passes for your soul, that he would never abuse the power it gives him over you.

You want him to be able to call you, the next time he's flung himself nobly into near-guaranteed death.

He's _incredibly_ beautiful, particularly when his hair is mussed and his face is a little bloodied and his eyes are shining like stars from the thrill of the chase and the need to protect an innocent life. And what are you, if not frivolously attracted to shining things?

Most of all, he has no idea of the gift's significance, which renders all of the above moot. Save (alas) the attraction.

(You'll regret that later, in a hotel in the desert, when he spits his understanding of its worth back in your face, and what hurts isn't how little he thinks of you but how little he believes you think of him.)

-—-

He does call, actually. Not by any arcane means, just as a friend of a friend—well, an ally of an ally. A business associate of a business associate. But he does call. So you do what any decent burglar would do: break into his apartment (it’s embarrassingly easy), find his drinks cabinet, and wait. 

He doesn’t keep you long. He sounds like an elephant, coming up the stairs; an elephant who talks aloud to himself. You can see him clearly as he fumbles around for the light switch. He’s tired, from stress as well as exertion. Even in just a couple months, he’s developed more wrinkles, grown a little more wan. You have an uncomfortable certainty that _you_ are the cause of some of that stress, or at least, your recent employments have been. Well, no time like the present to make up for past misdeeds (and to save the world.)

He finally finds the light switch, and gasps when his gaze falls on you, leaning against the kitchen counter. 

“Hello, Juno.” You smile and pour him a glass of the whiskey you’ve been holding. “It’s been a while.”

“Nureyev?” he says as a question—like he’s not sure he’s pronouncing it right, and not sure he has permission to try. It strikes a match down your spine, and then he adds more confidently, though still skeptical: “Peter Nureyev.” 

_Oh_.

It’s like a call to arms and drowning in golden, boiling molasses. It’s like someone plucked the strings of what passes for your soul and now they’re playing Beethoven’s Ninth. It’s _exactly_ like the click of handcuffs, last time

This was a mistake. This was the worst mistake you’ve ever made, and every instinct screams that you need to go _now_ , out the window, before he opens his mouth again—

“Nureyev?” Again the hesitancy and bewilderment, and you realize that you haven’t moved since he Named you, possibly haven’t breathed. You do need to breathe.

“The very same,” you manage, and the role of Mysterious But Dashing Thief is, at least, your easiest to play. It’s the closest to the truth. 

You reshelve the whiskey and make for the door, tapping his still-full glass in passing. “Don’t get too comfortable, Detective. We’re leaving immediately.”

-—-

Rangian Street Poker isn’t a human game.

Oh they’ve taken it up, mastered it, modified it with a card added here, a deck forgotten there—and the rule that neither player is allowed to lie; they made that up. It had never needed to be a rule, before.

This is the highest stakes you’ve ever played for. You have played them before—you’ve gambled you Name for a vault code, a choice piece of blackmail, an heiress’s heart…

But never when you weren’t absolutely certain that you would win (it’s only cheating if you get caught.) And never with someone who knew what was truly at stake—and Engstrom is watching you with too much avarice to be anything but aware. He’s a has-been, but he’s dealt in the world of trickery for long enough to know you for what you are.

On the plus side, savvy though he may be, Engstrom is only human. You once watched a woman lose her Name to one of _Them_ , and They twisted her self inside-out and upside-down before they killed her, and she was smiling the whole time. You aren’t human either; it’d be even easier for Them to do it to you. All Engstrom could do is own you bodily, and everyone on Mars would likely die when Miasma got her weapon some other way. 

Anyway, you have a counter-claim on hand. You could even pretend it was all planned, since the very first kiss. 

You’d really rather Juno hurry up and do his detecting, though, and render the whole danger irrelevant.

-—-

Likewise, the Ruby 7 isn’t a car.

She—he, really—certainly looks like a car, to Juno at least. As your detective reads the license plate strapped to its chest and realizes aloud, “Is this Engstrom’s car?”, you approach the beast with your hands open and empty, holding back a grin that, were you less dignified, would surely split your face. 

You knew it. You _knew_ it. You’ve heard of Jet Siquliak in two worlds, though you’ve only heard his name in one—and that rarely. No fool he, a changeling stolen away to the Other Place as a baby and escaped back to this world. Escaped on a wild white stag, no less, tamable only in legend. 

“Nureyev?” Juno is looking at you as though worried you’ve lost your mind. Understandable—thanks to a glamour more complex than any you’ve ever seen, he sees a very sleek red hovercar; you see a stag six feet tall at the shoulder with snow-white fur and birch-pale antlers, and wild eyes. You’re each acting accordingly.

“There, there, dear,” you murmur, to both the stag and the detective. Both eye you warily.

It only takes you a moment to pick the collar out of his ruff—darker hair than Engstrom has now, but of course he won’t have changed it. He couldn’t—if the stag was out of bridle for a second, it wouldn’t listen to anyone but the first who’d tamed it.

Or, perhaps, someone who smells of home, and makes the right sort of promises.

“I’ll break this,” you say, slipping a finger beneath the loop of hair, “and take you into the open sky again, if you’ll enter my service instead. Carry my companion and myself as safely and quickly as you can, wherever I bid, until by deed or death I release you.”

The stag scrapes his hoof and snorts, and butts his head gently against yours. You’re comfortable taking that as consent. You snap the hair with a flick of the wrist and a grin you don’t quite bother to hide.

“What the _hell_ is going on?” Juno demands.

“It’s a _legendary_ car. It’s the car Jet Siquliak used to steal the Iris of Jupiter.” You offer the assurance as you push him onto the stag’s back—and pour a little extra glamour on top of the stag’s own, as you leap on in front of him, until Juno’s eyes start to glaze over. You just don’t have time to explain...everything. “But look sharp, my dear—security could be catching up any moment.”

-—-

It’s possible that, riding across the red Martian desert on a snow-white stag, one theft behind you and a more daring one yet ahead, Juno Steel’s arm wrapped around your waist as his other shoots at the guards in hot pursuit...you laugh, more fey and free than you’ve ever been in your life. This is it. This is what you love.

-—-

“So how do we get off the train?” Juno asks. “If we’re not stopping it.”

Here is the hard part. You take a deep breath, one hand on the crate containing the world’s deadliest bomb.

“I need you to trust me,” you say, and hold out your other hand.

Juno hesitates, eyeing you up and down, before placing his hand in yours. At first it’s chary, on the verge of being snatched back, but in another moment it settles into something at least as firm as a handshake.

“Now I need you to give me your name,” you say quietly. There is no one who could overhear, but the moment demands sanctity. 

“...You already know my name?” he says, genuine confusion twisted with guardedness. Juno Steel, as you knew from the start, isn’t one for fairy tales, but he can tell that you’re being sincere and that makes him wary.

“Yes, but I don’t _have_ it. It’s different.” You shrug ever so elegantly. “I can do without it, but I’m afraid we’re both much more likely to be killed, then. And I would still need you to trust me, I’m afraid, where we’re going.”

He is silent a moment, before he grumbles, “Fine. Juno Steel. You can have it.” He squeezes your hand as he says it, perhaps more strongly than intended—but it’s nothing to the live-wire shock you can suddenly taste behind your teeth. It’s muffled—it must be muffled, he’s just human—but Juno Steel is the bloodied edge of a shield, the sun peeking around the edge of an approaching planet, and you suddenly understand why some of Them still steal mortals away just to keep somewhere timeless. Treasures for eternity. You are going to keep him _forever_ if you can.

Well, it is time for a little theft.

“We should be in and out quickly,” you warn, and make sure you have a solid grip on both Juno Steel and the Egg of Purus. “But just in case, don’t talk to anyone, don’t eat or drink anything, _especially_ if offered, and do _not_ let go of either me or the crate.” You can’t quite contain a shudder. “Hell only knows what one of Them would do with it, just for fun.”

“ _Where_ —” Juno starts to demand, your ever-curious detective, and who are you to refuse him an answer? You step backwards off the train and into the Other Place, dragging him and the Egg of Purus with you.

-—-

You stumble back out of the Other Place bedraggled, exhausted, bloody for a moment until the faerie blood evaporates in the dry Martian sun. You still have one hand on Juno Steel and one on the Egg of Purus, though the crate has been lost. But you are free and you are safe—until Miasma arrives, and points three guns at your head.

Even you can’t outrun lasers. You stay very still as Juno offers his freedom for your life. 

-—-

You can’t lie.

You’re trapped underground, the earth itself red with rusted iron; you’ve been electrocuted on and off for days, without proper food, water, or sleep; and you _cannot_ leave Juno behind. And you can’t lie.

But you learned how to work around that years ago. There are a hundred tricks—“I’m fine.” “I come as…” “Call me...” You know how to speak just enough truth and weave the stories people want to hear.

Juno knows all that, now. But not everything. So you can still say softly: “You’ll discover it all eventually. There’s no getting around that. So, look through my memories now. Then decide whether Peter Nureyev and all his baggage is worth taking home—or if you and I part ways once all this is done.”

Here’s the other thing: you didn’t really give him your Name, the first time. Not entirely. In writing, yes, and in enamored, impetuous intent, but there are limits to even that. He hasn’t heard you speak it aloud, the precise way your own lips shape the syllables of _you_. 

But the heart of the gamble is long-since made, and you think won. A little extra truth...often hurts. Almost always hurts, in your line of work. 

Juno tries to protest. You interrupt.

“The choice is yours, but I’d rather you made it now.”

He accepts the offer, of course—your ever-curious detective. You’re more aware of his investigation than ever, the gentle drilling into your mind that is unmistakably _Juno Steel_ , shield and sun (though this is entirely different than Faerie magic.)

He bleeds. He bleeds so much, iron-bright red, that you think it will only be worth it once you’re both in the open air again. But he’s also bleeding so _much_ that even once you’ve snapped the guard’s neck, even as you calculate that there are only so many more coming to cover so many winding tunnels, in which, exhausted as you are, _you_ will have the advantage of speed and silence, and you only need to get a step outside…

He’s bleeding so much that he can’t even stand, and you can’t possibly carry him and _keep_ that advantage. 

“I’ll come back for you,” you swear. “I promise—Juno, Juno Steel, I _promise_.” You cannot break a promise; your limbs will walk you back to fulfill. “You can call me, but even if you don't, I will rescue you from this place. I will not simply disappear.” 

You lay him back against the wall, red blood to red stone, and you run.

-—-

 _Peter Nureyev_.

You hear the call in your blood, in your bones, in the space between your heartbeats.

 _Peter Nureyev_.

Ordinarily, even from one of Them, a summoning by Name—learned from a book perhaps, or an overheard slip of the tongue—would require a ritual. A circle and runes, a full invocation, gifts of milk and honey. And it would hurt, you’ve heard; it would pull on you like barbed wire, particularly to so dire a place as a tomb of Martian dirt.

 _Peter Nureyev, I trust you and all but now would be a_ **_really_ ** _good time for you to_ —

Fortunately, Juno has your Name entire, so all he really needs to do is shout desperately from his own mind. Also, you are already in the room.

You make quick work of Miasma and the guards.

-—-

You have several problems right now. In roughly reverse order of priority, they are: 

The timer on the world’s deadliest weapon has begun, you have no idea how to stop it, and it’s rising slowly to the surface, where it will explode and kill everyone on the planet.

A homicidal woman who you’ve now watched die _twice_ is sitting on your chest, grinning as she strangles you.

She’s too fast and strong and silent to be human, but she’s noticed that you are, too. She’s observant and clever and an anthropologist, which apparently includes a dash of classical folklorist. She used to only know to call you “Thief”, but now Juno is here as well, and she’s in both your minds. So when she slipped up behind you, she didn’t slam you into the wall; she just leaned close and whispered, “Peter Nureyev, _stay still_.”

Being Named by Mag was like a morning dive into a waterfall. Being Named by Juno is like being called to arms with a symphony. Being Named by somebody who wants to kill you, it turns out—not just wants it but looks forward to it, to doing it as slowly and painfully as possible—is like being sliced open along the course of your entire spine with a blade of frozen nitrogen. 

(The Name was stolen, not given, so it’s not the command but the invasive shock that freezes you. But that’s long enough for Miasma to set the platform rising again and then start strangling you.)

And Juno looks distressed about that, and he’s bleeding from the eye again. Problems, problems…

“Juno Steel.” Miasma turns to grin at him, as cruel as any of Them. “Just in time to watch me kill your... Peter Nureyev.”

It hurts just as much the second time, or maybe that’s the aching lack of air. It’s dark, too; this isn’t the place for you. You scrabble at the hands on your throat, dimly aware that you’ve lost all your shreds of glamour, that you’ve turned too pale, thin, black- and bright-eyed. 

But Juno’s in your mind, too; he knows what to do. 

“Peter Nureyev!” It was a willing gift; it’s a symphony in molten gold. “Don’t listen to a damn word she says!” 

He shoots her arms as well. You think you might be in love. Miasma’s snarled response literally fades in your hearing as you shove her off. You can be terrified by the implications of that later, when you don’t need to get that platform lowered again.

-—-

You let yourself forget again, you stupid, Name-bound little _fool_ , that humans _lie_. 

Though he didn’t, did he. He said “I’ll cover you!” and you assumed he’d follow. 

You’re underground; you can’t step into the Other Place and stroll to where the other side of the door would be. You have to crack it the old-fashioned way, and all the time you feel like you are dying— _I will rescue you from this place_ ; you didn’t break the promise, he did, but it doesn’t make a difference to your heart. The lock takes what seems like hours. Mag would be so disappointed.

But on the other side, you find Juno alive—but bleeding badly. So nothing else is of particular concern for a while.

-—-

“Peter Nureyev.”

It’s a whisper, but you wake up, of course. Lazily, comfortably, called home in gold. Juno is standing in the doorway, looking back at you.

“I give it back to you,” he says. 

While you’re still reeling, he disappears. The door closes behind him.

-—- 

(You do come back, the next time he calls—in a roundabout, mundane, mutually summoned way. As a business associate of a business associate. 

First, you nearly burst out laughing when Buddy Aurinko holds out her hand and says, impatiently, “Give me a name. A reference. I’m building a crew who can trust each other—I’m not accepting you on my ship unless you already know someone on it.” 

“Juno Steel,” you trade her without a blink—you don’t have a use for it anymore. 

She eyes you hard, but accepts you on the crew. Good. You have debts to pay, catching up with you at last.

And maybe one to call upon, over a rudely returned gift.)

**Author's Note:**

> Which scene or line was your favorite? Comment below! 
> 
> I will neither confirm nor deny having two and a half more fics drafted for this AU, NOR totally listening to s3 with an eye for how to write a direct sequel. But that, obviously, will take a while to develop.


End file.
